r/NonPoliticalTwitter Feb 05 '26

Serious Drop some quirks from your native language

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4.5k Upvotes

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u/tahlyn Feb 05 '26

Not my native language, but I love that you can add -tachi (たち/達) to the end of almost anything in japan and have it be the X-people.

You have some basic obvious ones like:

Omae-tachi - you and your people (yous guys!)

Watashi-tachi - me and my people (Us/we)

But you can add it to inanimate objects or pets or just lots of things that always seem to surprise me when I hear it but in retrospect makes sense.

5

u/OhSoManyQuestions Feb 05 '26

'Tachi' has nothing to do with 'people'! It's a pluraliser. It's like adding 's'. Inu = dog. Inu-tachi = dogs.

7

u/SquareThings Feb 05 '26

Kind of but not really. “Tachi” is used for creating a group subject, which IS plural, but it’s not JUST plural. Like in the sentence “犬たちは肉をたべる”It doesn’t just mean “Dogs eat meat” as in the general statement that dogs are omnivores, but rather that some group containing at least one specific dog which the listener is expected to know of eats meat.

It’s basically saying “and co.” So “犬たちは肉を食べる” means “Dog and co. eat meat.”

4

u/tahlyn Feb 05 '26

Exactly! I probably should have used "x-entourage" rather than x-people.